The Stadium Series concept, born out of the incredible success of the Winter Classic, played annually on New Year’s Day, was a wildly successful run for the League this year, bringing great exposure to hockey and it’s biggest stars. In 2015, the profile of the events will only be bigger, and news that the Wild are likely to host a game at Target Field, home of Major League Baseball’s Minnesota Twins, will warm the hearts of millions of hockey fans in Minnesota, the State of Hockey, and nearby in Wisconsin and the Dakotas.
Even more intriguing is the NHL’s preference to have the Dallas Stars come in as the Wild’s opponent. The NHL usually gets their way, and although Minnesota wants to play the Chicago Blackhawks to try and foster a rivalry that isn’t really that great and to have superstar ‘Hawks Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews as promotional tools, I really hope it’s the Stars who venture into Target Field next year.
Why? Because that would mean tradition upon tradition. For those who don’t know, the Dallas Stars were once the Minnesota North Stars – you know, the team featuring, amongst others, the legendary Mike Modano, who, with some teammates, had a cameo in the second Mighty Ducks team. Soon after that, the North Stars went to Dallas, a move lamented in the final installment of the well-regarded Disney trilogy.
Is there a better way to celebrate generations of Minnesota hockey excellence than with the current NHL franchise taking on the former, celebrated one? I don’t think so. Here’s a chance to immerse the event in tradition. Bring Modano and the other greats of the North Stars in, throw in the greatest names from the University of Minnesota’s incredible hockey program and you have a cavalcade of hockey legends, many of whom have won NCAA Championships, Olympic gold medals or Stanley Cups. A few lucky ones have won all three.
Hockey is at it’s best when celebrating it’s past, and what better event to do this at than a Stars vs. Wild outdoor game, the very scenario of old-time – every one of the players on the ice would have grown up playing hockey outdoors, likely imagining they were some of the players who could be involved in events leading up to puck drop .
Imagine the list of names you could see: the Broten brothers, the scoring machine Tim Harrer, Hobey Baker winners Robb Stauber and Jordan Leopold, the afore-mentioned Modano, some of the 1980 Miracle on Ice team (like Dave McClanahan, Mike Ramsey and others), great administrators like Lou Nanne.
There’s nothing better than a gathering on Minnesotan hockey heroes who are key parts of the state’s hockey legacy. Importantly, also, there plenty of great names to be celebrated, those who are no longer with us: Herb Brooks, John Mayasich and John Mariucci.
If the NHL goes ahead and sends Dallas into Target Field, it’s not like they’re doing anything even approaching short-changing the spectacle, because the Stars, like the Wild, are a good team, poised to get even better. Leading the way for Dallas is the former #2 overall pick, Tyler Seguin. He’s a scoring machine, and he’s got other guns around him, like Jamie Benn and the exciting rookie Valeri Nichuskin, who is only nineteen and looks like being a fixture of the franchise for a long time to come.
There’s no lack of talent in a Stars-Wild match-up, that’s for sure. Yes, the Blackhawks are loaded with big-name players and are an established powerhouse rather than an up-and-coming team, and. Granted, the presence of guys like Kane and Toews would guarantee eyeballs focused on the Twin Cities, but the NHL owes a Stars-Wild it to Minnesota fans, who were so long without a franchise, to put this match-up together and to promote it like there’s no tomorrow.
Hockey, and it’s great traditions, deserve no less.
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